The other night I did some cleaning on the C: drive of my computer. I decided to use the Disk Cleanup wizard to free up more space. It told me after assessing my computer that I could free up 40 gb by deleting temporary program files, so I did.
Nothing was wrong immediately after, but the next day upon booting my computer up and logging in I was bombarded with dialogue boxes saying:
c:\ProgramData\favorites is not accesible.
access is denied.
[OK]
after clicking OK, the files on my desktop disappeared, along with all the programs in my start menu. Fearing my files had been somehow wiped, I checked my documents. Everything was there, and my programs were in the program files folder, but I can't access them conventionally.
For whatever reason, the lack of "program data\favorites" is preventing me from seeing my desktop files and start menu programs. It also is making my computer think that it's new in a way, because some programs I do manage to open ask for configuration as if it's the first time I use them.
I've tried to System Restore to the point before the deletion of the temporary program files, but it kept failing to do so.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.